Deadline reports that James Franco is “circling” a role in Werner Herzog’s long-in-development Gertrude Bell biopic Queen of the Desert. The role — which was once going to be played by Jude Law — is that of Henry Cadogan, a British diplomat who met Bell when she visited Persia, or modern-day Iran, in the 1890s. Bell herself will be played by Naomi Watts.

This bit of news reminds me that I never got around to blogging the last bit of casting news around this film, when it was announced last summer that Twilight star Robert Pattinson is attached to play T.E. Lawrence, a.k.a. “Lawrence of Arabia”. I found that news kind of amusing because Pattinson has already co-starred with another actor who once played Lawrence.

They’ve been making films about the Son of God for over a century. Here’s one man’s list of those that ascend to the top of the cinematic pack.

Of the making of movies about Jesus, there is no end. In the first three months of this year alone: Son of Man, which casts a black man as Christ and sets his life in modern South Africa, got positive reviews at Sundance; the makers of Color of the Cross, which also casts a black man as Christ, established a website with trailers for their work-in-progress; and New Line Cinema announced that Oscar nominees Keisha Castle-Hughes (Whale Rider) and Shohreh Aghdashloo (House of Sand and Fog) will star as the Virgin Mary and her cousin Elizabeth in a new movie about the Nativity, to be released in time for Christmas.

Based on a novel by John Le Carré, The Constant Gardener is more of a political message delivery system than a movie. It is also extremely well made. And unlike, say, The Interpreter — the recent Nicole Kidman-Sean Penn flick which paired Hollywood glamour with trite social parables, and ended up sending out muddled messages — this new film knows how to put its craftsmanship to the service of its message, which is fierce and focused throughout. Many political thrillers use the travails of the so-called Third World as an excuse to show glamorous people doing exciting things, but The Constant Gardener comes at it the other way ’round. Here, the mysteries and conspiracies take us deeper into an African situation which, the film assures us, reflects the reality on the ground.